Weekly Report for Week Ending May 9, 2002

The LIGO Executive Committee Agenda for Monday  May 13, 2002 will be:

 (Meeting time: 10:30 am Pacific Time)

Open meeting 10:30 - 11:30

1. Announcements
2. LSC Issues (Weiss)
3. Comments on Weekly Report
4. WBS 1 LIGO I Construction (Lindquist)
• Field Change Orders/Contingency Liens/Change Requests
5. WBS 2 LIGO Lab Operations
• Administration (Lindquist)
• Sites (Raab, Coles, Shoemaker, Sanders)
• Detector (Whitcomb, Coyne)
• Campus Research Facilities (Weinstein (40 Meter), Libbrecht (TNI), Zucker(LASTI))
• Data Analysis and Computing (Lazzarini)
6. WBS 3 and 4  Advanced R&D and LIGO II (Sanders)

Special Items:  Revised publications policy

Special Announcements:

Weekly Report Highlights
 

LSC Issues (Weiss)

no report

LIGO I Construction/LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

LIGO Operations--Administration

A site teleconference was held on Thursday, May 9, 2002.  The following items were discussed:

Costs vs. Budget: Current OPs is running at about 85 percent of budget.  R&D is running at approximately 14 percent due to fact that we are just recently closing down the Advanced R&D Grant and shifting costs to the new Cooperative Agreement.  There are a number of large cost equipment items in the new Cooperative Agreement budget that will bring those costs up. We will monitor this for another month and review it with Gary when the May data is available.

Construction Livingston: Work on punch list items continues.  Gerry to forward copy of new punch list to Ed Jasnow.

Construction Hanford: Siding subcontractor doing an excellent job, but slowly.  Work around plan has been requested.  Discussed the possibility of installing a gate to control traffic near the detector at Hanford.  All traffic other that operators and vendors that must have access would be guided to the new building.

Science Run: More people, who are likely to get into trouble, will be on-site during the Science Run...need operating procedures.  Have to review and need to make sure that they are available in the right place.

Outreach: Considering bringing in teacher to work with other teachers on exhibit.  Could move $25K from 2.1 equipment and supplies to cover, but considering use of Visitor's Grant.

The list of current actions revised to reflect the status of open actions assigned through May 9, 2001 may be found at ACTION LIST.

From: Ed Chargois <chargois_e@ligo.caltech.edu>

• No report--at Hanford..

>From: Linda Turner - turner@ligo.caltech.edu>

Web pages for the DCC give simple how-to's for document numbering, easy access to the latest on-line documents, and search capabilities for the DCC database. Take a look. . .

ACCOMPLISHMENTS

• No report.

ACTIVITY

• Volume of incoming packages was particularly heavy for this period.
• Progress continues on conversion of old financial reports (IFIS) to electronic form.
• Electronic document activity was light for this period.
• In the process of transporting three boxes of contractual close out files from the DCC to the storage room in the sub-basement.  Process involves making file folders, database input, taking all the files to the storage room, and filing them in the cabinets.  With such a large amount of files being transferred at one time, it will require for all the close out files currently in storage to be reorganized.
 

05/09/02	Packages	Faxes
In	54	44
Out	10	36

From: Esther Cunningham <esther@ligo.caltech.edu>

Press here for ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY DATA .

From: "Brambila, Ruth" <Ruth.Brambila@caltech.edu>

• Completed change order 22 to Hytec, and the basic order to Howden Buffalo.  Closed PO's and removed active encumbrances.
• Working on change order #12 to Research Electro Optics, change order #2 to Chervenell, change order #14 to Brunt Construction, and change order #16 to Waveprecision.
• Followed up with Norman Gordon on the Washington sales tax paid on the crane for LHO. He indicates that he is still working with Washington State to try to get the money reimbursed since the vendor has already submitted it to the state.  In addition, he is still working on finding out getting some of the taxes paid in the audit period refunded to Caltech as those vendors have also submitted those taxes to the state.  He expects to have more information in about one month.

• Completed and posted on the network, Monthly Reports for Construction, Operations and R&D as of the end of April 2002.
• Responded to requests for information from the DCAA.
• Requested and have received approval for two new accounts as part of the Construction award for General Computing at Hanford and Livingston, that will have the off-campus Indirect Rate.
• Prepared and submitted Cost Transfers for approximately $166K of expenditures for fabrications by the Detector group that had been misclassified to non-fabrication accounts.

 
• Financial reports can be found at: http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/~fireport

From: irena@ligo.caltech.edu (Irena Petrac)

• Wave Precision Inc.: CO No. 16, for the purchase of 20 Q substrates, was released to the  Purchasing. An advanced copy was faxed to the company.
• REO: CO No. 12, for IBS coating of a batch of 17 LIGO substrates, was released to the Purchasing. An advance copy was faxed to the company.

CONSTRUCTION:

• Construction of the LLO Staging Building nears completion on a half-life basis, close but never finished.  The dispute with the crane subcontractor, Church-Dailing, has been temporarily resolved in that they have agreed to install the crane stops and submit a claim to Brunt in the amount of $5,200.  Brunt will forward that claim to us and we will resolve it.  Another area in dispute concerns the painting of the exposed beams in the high bay area. Brunt claims the drawings were incorrect and did not show the beams.  We claim they raised the ceiling, which exposed the beams.  The subcontractor proposes to paint the beams for $2,500.  This is still being reviewed.  Remainder of the items are on a lengthy punch list.
• Siding is going up on the LHO OSB East Building, and construction remains on schedule.  The RFP for the audio/visual equipment for the auditorium was released last week, with proposals due on May 20.

• The sites are preparing site safety and operating procedures and control room operator rules for review.

SUPPORT (Baldon, Torres, Lloyd, Tischler)

• No report.

• Ruth and I worked together on closing out some more complete POs with remaining encumbrances.
• Fifty-two invoices were processed for payment this reporting period by Esther and me.   I tracked some invoice problems, and reviewed and recorded payments processed by Esther the week of April 29.  For the total number of incoming invoices received for this period see "Cost Schedule Control Systems" report by Esther Cunningham.
• Processed the usual requisitions and change orders.
• Continue to monitor contract and blanket order encumbrance and notify task managers when supplements are needed.
• Jim continues with data entry in the LIGO database and helping out in the DCC.

• Submitted a list to V. Kondrashov of LSC documents to be posted on the web page.  Helped format a cv of B. Kells.
• Continue to track progress of orders placed for M. Smith while he's away.  Submitting the incoming orders, mostly partials, to S. Vass.
• Arranged telecons for:  Input Output design review, Core Optics, SEI retrofit adjustment, and Suspension Working group.
• Placed several Pcard orders, and reconciled several more after chasing the documentation.  Ordered for the Sys Admin group printer toner, which is currently on sale.
• INFORMATION : US postal rates change on June 30, 2002.  Visit -- http://www.usps.com/ratecase

• Group and 40m pictures coordinated last Monday.
• Meeting with Criselda for p-card issues.
• Coverage for Irene and minimal travel needs.
• Coverage for Barry in Donna's absence.
• Meeting w/photographer to review CIT proofs from Monday.
• Preparation for next Monday for press kit and folder design meeting.
• Press related issues with Jill Perry.

Advanced LIGO (Frey)

Progress Period from 05.03 to 05.09

Accomplishments:

• Weekly Advanced LIGO Project Controls meeting was not held this week.  See schedule below for next meeting date.
• Commissioning Calendar: (Completed)
• Larry and I worked together to finalize the security settings.  Larry will be installed encryption at a later date..
• Executed a phone conference with Peter Fritschel and set him up to administrate the calendar..
• You can view the deployed calendar at:   http://arcturus.ligo.caltech.edu/cgi-bin/Calcium37.pl?CalendarName=Commish&Op=ShowIt&Amount=Month&NavType=Both&Type=Block
• Continued to work with Primavera regarding an outstanding technical issue and received a program patch that I am now using and testing.
• Advanced LIGO MRE Proposal (Highest Priority)
• Continuing the development of the Cost Estimate.
• Continue to pursue all other sub system schedules.  Continue to review all subsystem schedules and incorporating new target dates per DCC Doc. No. LIGO-M020121-A by Dennis Coyne.
• The following is a summary of status by sub system:
• COC - Work on action items per second review continues.  Next meeting date has not been scheduled.  Updated meeting minutes and issued for information.
• PSL - Next meeting date has not been scheduled.  Updated meeting minutes and issued for information.
• AOS - Work on action items continues.  Inputting / reviewing data provided by David S.  Next meeting date has not been scheduled.
• IO -  Work on action items continues.  Next meeting date has not been scheduled.
• SUS - Working with SUS group to incorporate current comments.  Updated meeting minutes and issued for information.
• SEI - Work on action items continues.  Next meeting date has not been scheduled.
• ISC - Continue to review data.
• All other subsystems have yet to be scheduled for their first review.  These dates are pending per direction from Gary Sanders and Dennis Coyne.
• Continue to update the TNI Schedule and incorporate any changes.
• Data pending to revise plan to version 3 due to additional efforts to isolate noise.
• Updated the plan with progress as of 05.03.02 and  posted to site.
• Sent out update data requests for progress as of 05.17.02.
• Continue to update the LASTI Schedule and incorporate any changes.
• Updated the plan with progress as of 05.03.02 and  posted to site.
• Sent out update data requests for progress as of 05.17.02.
• Project Plan for the 40-Meter Lab Upgrade continues.
• Updated the plan with progress as of 05.03.02 and  posted to site.
• Sent out update data requests for progress as of 05.17.02.
• Cost Book Tool.
• ROSTER DATABASE:
• Continue work on my action items providing BK with needed data.
• Rai Weis provided information on work group leaders to facilitate the collection of that data.  This will allows us to input into the database a code linking people to the appropriate working groups for reporting / sorting.
• COST BOOK DATABASE:
• Nothing new to report.
• DCAA - Work continues on the incurred cost audit.
• Nothing new to report  (All Quiet on the Western Front).
• Development of the Advanced LIGO Project Controls Guidebook continues.
• Project Web Site for posting schedule and progress related data continues to be updated with the latest and greatest.
• See http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~tfrey/index.html

• Next weekly Advanced LIGO Project Controls meeting scheduled for May 14th at 9am at LSCR.  Subject:  MRE Cost and Proposal Development.
• Advanced LIGO MRE Proposal (Highest Priority Task)
• Highest priority is the development of the Cost Estimate.
• Will continue to pursue all other sub system schedules.
• PSL - Will complete estimate and schedule changes.
• AOS - Continue inputting changes to and prepare for next meeting TBD. (New data from David to be input).
• IO - Continue inputting changes to and prepare for next meeting TBD.
• SUS - Continue inputting changes to and prepare for next meeting TBD.
• Will update the plan when data is made available.
• SEI - Continue inputting changes and prepare for next meeting TBD.
• COC - Work on action items by Garilynn continues.  Anticipate schedule changes prior to next meeting TBD.
• ISC - Finish review of data.  Input data and change WBS as requested.
• Will issue updated meeting minutes for every subsystem as action items from most recent review are completed.
• Will Continue to update the TNI Schedule and incorporate any changes.
• Will update the plan with progress as of 05.17.02 and  post to site by the 20th.
• Will Continue to update the LASTI Schedule and incorporate any changes.
• Will update the plan with progress as of 05.17.02 and  post to site by the 20th.
• Will continue updating the 40 meter schedule and incorporate any changes.
• Will update the plan with progress as of 05.17.02 and  post to site by the 20th.
• Roster Database
• Will continue to work with BK and executing action items.
Cost Book Tool development continues.  (Highest Priority Task)
• Mapping and formatting of OPS cost data for input will now continue with co-operative agreement approved.
• Will continue to work with BK executing action items.
• Will continue to provide support to PL for DCAA audit(s).
• Will continue the development of the Advanced LIGO Project Web Site.
• Will continue the development of the Advanced LIGO Project Controls Guide Book.

A final draft of the quarterly progress report for the end of February incorporating all suggestions has been distributed for comment.

Change Request CR-020006 adjusting the FY 2002 Operating budget for Technical and Engineering support staff was approved on May 6, 2002.  Minutes have been distributed: LIGO-M020210-00-P.

The following additional change request has been submitted:
 

From: Cindy Akutagawa <cindy@ligo.caltech.edu>

• Various personnel/payroll /HR related work.

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

• Continued GoF+  ("Gang of Five Plus") work with Linda Turner in identifying and locating (DCC or originator ?)  LIGO documents to list/link with the new LIGO information site. This week also helped Linda with redo/clean up of the LIGO vacuum qualification procedure (she had to "translate" from an old/original Frame version).
• Worked with Dorothy Lloyd and Gina Salone to locate and to place a Rush-order for five electronic racks for LDAS installations at LLO and LHO (often this type of electronic rack is out-of-stock and requires a four to six week delivery lead time).
• Received word from Physical Plant that they had received the go-ahead (funding) to begin Phase Two of room 215 Synchrotron modification. The contractor has surveyed the site and begun the design work for installation of the fire suppression system. The design and approval phase (both Caltech and City of Pasadena) is estimated to take three to four weeks. The hardware installation work will be scheduled on a non-interfering basis with LDAS operations.

LIGO Hanford Observatory (LHO) and Interferometer Operations (Raab)

NO REPORT

LIGO Livingston Observatory (LLO) and Interferometer Operations (Coles)

Commissioning at Livingston

Noise studies: The antisymmetric wavefront sensor servo not only maintains the recycled interferometer at peak stored cavity power but also reduces the antisymmetric signal in the I phase (ASI). Studies this week established that ASI signal is not due to offsets in l- or L- control loops but rather due to misalignments. The largest sensitivity is to angular motions of the ETM followed by much smaller sensitivity to the beam splitter and recycling mirror.   We have installed a new less aggressive elliptic low pass filter in the mode cleaner servo path to retain interferometer and mode cleaner locking as we attempt to reduce the contribution of frequency noise in the DARM signal. The hope is that by engaging the common mode servo and reducing the mode cleaner cross over frequency and, finally, by engaging the elliptic filter; we can bring the noise in the main differential channels to the level of the known coil driver noise. We did not realize this hope.

Interferometer Operations: We were slowed down by two incidents with the CDS computers. The first was a failure in synchronization of the DAQ computer with the rest of  the system which caused the diagnostic tools to fail. The second was a failure in a computer to control the EPICS interface to the ASC system. This computer is temporary and too slow for the current tasks. It needs to be replaced before S1.

General: Logging has been extremely heavy in the past week. Crews have worked near LIGO from dawn to dusk and even disturbed us on a Sunday.

External Pre-Isolation: I've completed a very busy trip to Stanford to coordinate the hand-off of the Stanford hydraulic external pre-isolator to LIGO. The Stanford group bent over backwards to accommodate my visit. I spent the greater portion of my time going over the actuator piece by piece with Corwin Hardham, and I left with a clear understanding of the assembly and his reasons for designing it as he did. Have had several telecons with the Parker-Hannifin applications engineer about modifications to their servo valve. Also met with Amit Ganguli who designed the valve modifications and test procedures. Also spent 3 days in Dallas learning the fundamentals of Solidworks. (Kern)

Laser Safety: Harry Overmeyer, who met with the system's installer while Jonathan was away reports that the difficulties we were having at the
X-end were a consequence of a logical error in his script, which he identified and corrected. Looks like in the ~10 days JK was away that only 5 alarms were triggered, mostly because people inadvertently opened doors after forgetting to swipe their cards on exiting. So folks are getting into the habit. (Stapfer/Kern)

GC: Cleaning a couple of viruses off some machines here. Still evaluating some auditing software. Looking at the firewall configuration and trying to identify problem areas for when we will reconfigure the network topology here. Ordered some components to put a system back together that was stripped. This will be a management console for the auditing software.

CDS: Worked on setting up a monitor for conlog status. Worked on problems with the DAQ Controller / DTT system found a timing error in the DAQ Controller. Worked on solving problems with the ASC Epics system couple of nights ago. The ASC EPICS processor is slow and needs to be changed some time soon. CDS Disk space is full and taking measures to clear disk space.
Chethan

Detector/Technical Support (Whitcomb, Coyne)

40 Meter Interferometer (Weinstein)

• Suspension Controllers (B. Abbott, Heefner, Taylor, Ugolini)
• After a small fix to the power cables and an upgrade to 5 amp fuses, the wiring of the 1Y5 rack (SUS front end and MC controllers) is completed.
• Jay is now testing the auxiliary controls. Somehow the Motorola processor did not get a EPROM installed, so we are booting with the PEM processor in the meantime.
• The front end VME crate could be returned as early as Friday, but probably early next week.
• Electronics (B. Abbott, Taylor):
• Ben has completed the redesign of the ISS photodiodes, and the boards are being stuffed. Rich and Flavio may come by and prototype the ISS servo here briefly before delivery to Hanford.
• Ben is working on cables for the PSL QPDs (now in their final position) and a DB25 tester for in-vacuum cables.
• Bob is starting the cross-connects for 1Y2, the mode cleaner LSC and ASC rack.
• Optical Layout (Smith, Ugolini, Miyakawa, Vass)
• All of the in-house components in the IO path have been installed on the PSL table. We are still waiting for a half-wave plate, a polarizing beam splitter, and two lenses. Osamu is aligning into our Tropel to analyze the beam. The steering mirrors for the several output beams on the AP table are the next to be installed.
• Osamu has been inventorying the components in the IMCR and OMCR path. We are still missing many parts, particularly home-drawn pieces from our machine shop.
• STACIS seismic isolation system (Ugolini): Dennis has swapped every cable and component that can be swapped on the SV-NW isolator without affecting the problem behavior (the foot oscillates when an RS232 cable is plugged into the controller). Before removal, we will measure the transfer function of the foot with the RS232 cable in, to see if the oscillation is real or only in the readback. In either case, this isolator and the EE-NW (broken PZT stack) will be removed and returned to TMC as soon as possible.
• Facilities and vacuum envelope (Vass, Jones):
• A partial pumpdown has proven that V1 is the source of the leak observed last week. A replacement kit was received from VAT on Wednesday, but they could not verify whether it had been baked. Bob will bake it this weekend, and it will be installed next week.
• Steve and Dennis assembled the AP optical table cover, and two small problems were discovered: the handles were missing, and the holes for beams from the OOC were 1" off-center. Larry has ordered the handles and a new east wall, and both should arrive along with the SP&MC table cover in 2-3 weeks.
• The camera boxes for mounting on the mode cleaner viewports are also in the shop, and expected in 2-3 weeks.
• Computing/DAQ (Miyakawa, Ugolini, Ivanov, Pedraza):
• Osamu is learning E2E, and will be working on a new compound cavity including a signal recycling mirror, so that the time step of an Advanced LIGO simulation will still be governed by the length of the arms.
• Starting on Saturday, April 27, our frame builder began intermittently fauting. One RAID disk appeared to be misbehaving (the RAID was writing to it constantly). After replacement, the DAQ worked for a few days, then intermittently fauted again for an afternoon, with the same error message as before, but no obvious misbehavior by the RAID. The problem has not reoccurred since that afternoon, so we are still not 100% sure what caused it, or if the RAID disk we replaced was bad.
• The main server on our Martian network, op140m, is being moved to the control room. We have a loaner laptop for viewing EPICS screens in the clean room while Mike Pedraza builds our wireless network setup.
• South Annex Bake Ovens (Taylor, Cardenas):
• Bob has an oven ready for the V1 replacement kit.
• Bob is designing a jig to hold optics safely in place during future bakes.
• We are holding off on baking the Dynamic Light Controls mirror mounts until Mike Smith returns.

• ARCHIVE of 40 meter Weekly reports prior to October, 2001
• LIGO Caltech 40 meter prototype Upgrade Page
• LIGO home page at Caltech
• LIGO home page at MIT

Thermal Noise Interferometer (Libbrecht)

no report

LASTI (Zucker)

no report

Data Analysis and Computing (Lazzarini)

Simulation and Modeling (Bhawal)
E2E Physics meeting
----------------------
Virginio talked about transverse, bounce and roll modes included by him in E2E's simple 3d
mirror model and tests to validate the model. Details in http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~e2e

Next e2e package release
--------------------------
(Hiro) We expected to release a new e2e package this week, but due to problems of several
components, the released is delayed one week. A test tarbal has been built and is being
tested, including the installation process which supposedly is more robust and easy.

SLU (Southern Louisianna Univ) is interested in installing e2e, one to help to develop
e2e itself and one for the education of students. They started preparation to install the
new package.

Noise from newly developed SimLIGO
-----------------------------------
(Matt) Began preliminary noise studies with SimLIGO. Seismic and electronic noise
predictions are a good match for the high and low frequency components of
the 2k spectrum.  Shot noise is a factor of 2 higher than the LIGO goal.

Mechanical simulation
----------------------
(Virginio)
The new primitive to simulate all the 6 DOF of the mirror has been tested in a stand
alone program. This new module provides 12 inputs i.e. the 6 suspension points dof and
the actuation in the 6dof.
A systematic check of the time domain outputs (step and impulse responses) for each single
input has been done also.
Discrepancy between the measured resonant frequencies of the suspension and the predicted
ones is around a percent on average.
Integration in the e2e framework is under the debugging stage.

Test of the MSE2 library is going on.

Validation of Full IFO run with mode mismatches
------------------------------------------------
(Biplab)  For a case which considers as-built differences in arm mirrors and some amount
of thermal lensing as well in an IFO of 139meter length (139m was chosen to reduce the
build-up time so that a model that uses only primitive modules can be run for shorter
duration), primitive and summation cavity runs agree with each other in mirror positions
as well as power at all ports during build-up, lock-acquisition and locked state.

Two different cases are validated : thermal lensing (effective change in input mirror
refractive index) was chosen such that in one case (in near-matched state) the recycling
cavity is stable and in other case (more mismatch) it's unstable.
Studies related to unstable cavity is going on.

Dual recycling Michelson summation cavity
------------------------------------------
Dr. Miyakawa, a new postdoc of Alan, showed interest in developing the power recycled
Michelson cavity module, based on the work done by Malik. Malik will provide a note of his
calculation and matlab code he developed.

Code development and maintenance
---------------------------------
(Biplab) A bug in Gaussian field calculation in recycling summation cavity module is corrected.
(Ed Maros) Modified distribution rules to distribute JGo.jar as a seperate jar file.

Alfi
-----
(Bruce)
- Nearing completion of re-writing and re-integrating a better implementation of
   junctions back into Alfi5.

(Melody)
- Fixed more problem reports for alfi5.
- Worked with Ed on some build problems.

LIGO Data Analysis System

Software Systems (Blackburn)
Now that the 0.2.0 release of LDAS is installed an running at all the
sites, we have focused on the needed functionality and changes for a
0.3.0 release in mid June. The highest priority item for the next
release is the integration of a new interface to TCL for extending
the management of data transmission between the various APIs. This
interface, know as TCL Channels, is about 80% complete at the C++
level and is currently being tested on a simple testbed. These tests
should complete by the end of the week and we will be able to add
this interface to the APIs' TCL level starting early next week.

After the release of 0.2.0, we began a campaign to stress the threads
in the dataConditionAPI at a new level. These stress tests indicated
a whole new dimension of thread issues with our environment. A simple
"a.out" test program was developed to test the handling of exceptions
in multi-threaded applications which revealed that exception handling
was not working properly in this environment. We used this a.out on
several different LINUX environments and quickly found out that the
compilation of our /ldcg version of GCC was incorrect. We are now
tracking down the origin of this incorrect compilation. The correct
way to compile GCC is known and documented and was shown to be the
correct rules. But it is not know if these were followed or if some
external process was used to build GCC. This will be fixed today. In
the meantime, we have discovered that other applications such as the
debugger will also need to be rebuilt.

Once the problem with the GCC was discovered, a search of Intel's
developer's corner on the web also identified several other issues
with the use of threads under LINUX and a collection of fixes to the
problem which we will need to investigate and correct.

Several performance issues associated with the 0.2.0 release have
been identified and fixed. The startup time for wrapperAPI jobs on
the BEOWULF has been reduced from 8 or 9 seconds down to 2 or 3 and
should be further reduced with a little more effort. The time it
took to distribute events from search codes within the eventMonitorAPI
has been significantly improved also. We have also moved all the
status handling out of the managerAPI and into the individual APIs
to greatly improve the accuracy of these logs and to improve the
response of the managerAPI. Unfortunately, we still have a very
large bottleneck in the production of reduced process frames in the
frameAPI. This is being looked into, but no solution has been
identified at this time.

We have also increased the amount of logging information captured
by the system. If an API is restarted, it system resource utilization
is now captured in logs. Also, all user jobs now produce a log of
the summary statistics associated with the job.

We are evaluating an upgrade in the version of our C++ XML parsing
library (Xerces-1.7). We hope to successfully integrate this newer
release into the next LDAS.

In addition to these activities we have continued to perform routine
testing on the system and to fix bugs that have been filed against
the system.

Hardware Systems (Anderson)

Hardware Systems (Anderson)
CIT:

Continued HPSS migration from Redwoods to 9940s (stopped 3590 work for
the moment as per James Patton's instructions), HPSS user directory
reconfiguration (moving towards no data in user home directories) and
account maintainence (mostly retiring accounts).

Still working to get StorageTek to make good on replacing the Ultra
10.

Tried out more SAM-QFS features (expanding filesytem), recovery
features (using tar to retrieve data) and failure modes (failing one
RAID subsystem in a multiple RAID configuration).  Trying to figure out
a way to import metadata for tape resident data into an existing
filesystem (i.e. merge in the inode info for data on tape), as this
would make importing LIGO data from LHO/LLO into the CIT archive a lot
easier.

LHO:
1) Backed up SFTs at LHO onto tape.  Will do the same at LLO.

2) Ordered 64 Cat5E snagless ethernet cables for new beowulf nodes.

Data Analysis Activities (Lazzarini)
Mendell:
1) The knownpulsardemod DSO ran from Thu May 2 2002 to Sun May 5 2002,
generating SFTs at LHO and LLO.  The jobs ran 2 to 3 times faster than
for the previous release of ldas, averaging 170 seconds to compute an
SFT on 2048 seconds of data. That is 12 times real time.

2)  At LHO 1420 jobs were run; 4 jobs failed with an error in LDAS, for
a 0.28% failure rate.  However, 40 jobs at LHO claimed to finish without
error but produced no SFT output, for another 2.8% failure rate.

3) At LLO 703 jobs were runO; 3 jobs failed with an error in LDAS, for a
0.43% failure rate.  However, 22 jobs at LLO claimed to finish without
error but produced no SFT output, for another 3.1% failure rate.

4) Reported to LDAS the observed failure modes and opened ldas gnats
PR1545 which documents the main problem with jobs finishing without
errors but also without SFT output.

5) Preparing for trip to UWM next week to work on the knownpulsardemod
DSO.

Shawhan:
Attended a meeting of the Inspiral Upper Limit Working Group in Milwaukee
over the weekend, at which a plan was formulated to complete a number of
studies and write a technical report before the S1 run.

Worked on modifying guild and other LIGOtools programs to be able to work
in the control rooms at the observatories, using proxy servers on the CDS
gateway machines to communicate with the outside world.

Lazzarini:
The stochastic background group met at UTB over the weekend to discuss current status of results and our understanding of the data from the playground set.
John Whelan has been doing most of the analysis, while Tania Regimbau from MIT and Sukante Bose from WSU/Pullman have takne on the task of generating a pseudorandom stochastic background as a set of frame data that can be added to the raw data in order to verify the analysis pipeline.
In addition, the UFl group has been taking a different look at the data, prompted primarily by the concern over 60Hz mains tele-correlations, and is considering an analysis technique that is more robust in the face of nonGaussian statistics, but for which the physics interpretation will be more difficult (requiring extensive Monte Carlo runs with different hypotheses for stochastic correlations). The technique is highly non-linear, converting the digitized raw data to a string of +/-1, which are then cross-correlated (effectively passing the data trough a 1-bit ADC).

General Computing (Wallace)
MIT:
-Installed ghostscript filter for inkjet
-Configured harddrive/disksuite on sunblade for nightly backups
-Investigated network trouble in NW22 (duplex problem)
-Moved equipment to NW22

Livingston:
(Shannon)
-Cleaning a couple of viruses off some machines here.
-Still evaluating some auditing software.
-Looking at the firewall configuration and trying to identify problem areas for
when we will reconfigure the network topology here.
-Ordered some components to put a system back together that was stripped. This
will be a management console for the auditing software.

Hanford:
(Christine)
- Continued with inventory of software and hardware on site.
- Spoke with Ed Chargois about disposing/fixing broken PC and Sun
monitors.  I need to make a list for him of the items I don't want
anymore.
- Fixed a printer that was reporting repeated paper jams.  Tracked a
user's e-mail problems to a full hard drive.  Installed a compact flash
reader on another guest PC.
- The last of the new PCs has been set-up, backed-up and distributed.  I
started cleaning personal files off the old PCs and cleaning the dust
and grime off the old PC cases and insides.
- Started writing a perl cgi to put the work permit forms on the web.

(Larry)
-More investigation work done for the WAN connection with NoaNet. Albert will be
meeting with people from NoaNet and PNNL to work out a few logistical items.

CIT:
(Mike)
-Changed some registry settings on the Win 2000 computers in the 40M, to prevent
these machines from trying to become the master browser.
-Swapped out Fred Mann's old computer with a new Dell 4400 that is loaded
with all GC software plus additional engineering software packages. This
included backing up his data and transferring it over to the new computer
and then making the software adjustments to users preferences; then taking
a ghost image of this computer.
-Repaired hardware problems IDE controller seems to be going out I made some
adjustments and got her back up and running.
-Setup and broadcasted a conference for Ed Jasnow.
-Helped Veronica setup to broadcast a couple of conferences.
-Loaded a new Dell 8200 for Alan W. with General Computing and Engineering
software that he requested plus took a ghost image of this computer.
-VRVS reflector; Contacted CERN about setting up a Reflector over here at
Caltech but was informed to hold off because adding an additional reflector
would not be dedicated to the LIGO project as of now. They are looking into this
and asked to contact them in a few months. CERN is in the process of upgrading
the current VRVS 2.5 to 3.0 and claim that this upgrade will improve many
aspects of VRVS and will increase the number of virtual rooms to relieve
the current booking of a virtual room problem as of now.
CERN is studying the possibility of creating one or a few Virtual Rooms
specific to each reflector or to a defined community of users. This way if
all the global virtual rooms would be fully booked, people could always
have a few other Virtual Rooms to use, but local to them. So just people in
one specific community could book or use them, or just people attached to
one specific reflector.
-Upgraded and reloaded Ed Chargois PC for Ed Chargois.
-Had to add additional hardware (disk drive) to a visitor computer.
-Finishing up a Laptop to put back into loaner pool.

(Lisa)
-Put some major work into the web-based inventory stuff.  The electronic
version is now the authoritative set of data for the 115 and 114 subnets.  There
is still quite a bit more work to be done on the system, but it is robust enough
to start using.  Access is currently restricted to the ligo domains and via
password.
- The ISDN lines are down on the modem pool.  I am working with the caltech
telephone office to figure out what the deal is.
- Still working on building a test string with pretend versions of sirius, acrux
and ligo. I'm having trouble with pretend sirius' nisplus tables.
- Did some work with the mailman archives for Albert.

(Veronica)
- LIGO website: Working on the Press Kit website. Rewrote the Internal
Bulletin Boards webpage; it is now ready for posting. Along with Larry and
Mike, organized the videoconferencing broadcasts of 2 LIGO seminars.
Looking into performance issues of the LSC server; MIT reported problems
with getting the server to respond.
Updated the Elba 2002 Conference webpages.
Posted updates to various parts of the LIGO website.
- CaJAGWR: videotaped a lecture by William Hamilton; compressed and posted
it at the CaJAGWR website. Posted a few updates and made arrangements for
the seminars.

(Larry)
-Worked with Veronica, Mike and others with the VRVS setup. For the most part
things went well. However, someone did take the computer and camera between
sessions and changed the settings on the h/w and s/w. This caused problems in
the quality for a couple of sessions and we are still working on getting the
units back to an acceptable working condition.
-Along the same line we are working on setting up VNC services to be used for
conferences/meetings. These procedures should be on-line in a few weeks. Also,
look at other webcast options.
-Worked/working a number of procurement issues. Mostly tracking orders at this
time.
-Setup new mail alias files for the LSC and LIGO CIT only mailing lists. Testing
on the files should start next week. With the new alias files the donut
announcement will go only to CIT and not to other locations as it has in the
past. Rita will be taking care of the LSC mail list and Ryan will be taking care
of the citonly mail list.
-Worked on a number of h/w installs in the computer room.
-Worked a couple of hack and spam issues. New e-mail spam that shuts down the
blah blah icon on eudora is now being looked into. In general most people have
been good about keeping their virus-scan s/w up to date.
 

LIGO II/Advanced R&D (Sanders)

From: Mark Barton <mbarton@ligo.caltech.edu>

I've released a new version 1.2 of the triple model and version 2.3 of
the quad model on my models page (<http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~mbarton/
SUSmodels/>). They've had a fair amount of debugging of the thermal noise
aspects and are at the point of being useful tools. I'm almost finished a
summary of the validation results and I hope to release it as T020011-00
by Friday. Some sample thermal noise plots for a quad similar to the MIT
prototype but with fused silica in the last stage are at <http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~mbarton/SUSmodels/asus4/ThermalNoiseTest.pdf>. It turns out that above the highest peak in the transfer function for any
DOF, the thermal noise for that DOF in the full system asymptotes very
quickly to a simple prediction based on the last stage only.
 

Status reports for the CO Working Groups, Thursday, May 9, 2002
Helena: Coating Status
Received 2 polished blanks manufactured from Suprasil 311 SV. The substrates are being
measured for "Q" at Stanford.
Further processing TBD
MLD
One Ta2O5 / SiO2 coating run failed at MLD as consequence of a mechanical failure in
the coater. All the parts were lost.
The run is being repeated at this time.
Because MLD can not anneal coatings higher than 500º C we may have one substrate of
each type annealed at MLD at 500º C and the other 2 at SMA/Lyon at 600º C.
This may help determine if there is a contamination issue within their coating process or
with their annealing procedure.
SMA/Lyon
In early June SMA will deliver "Q" substrates coated with 30 layers - 1/8 wave of Ta2O5
and 3/8 waves of SiO2.
To complete the last tasks in the Memorandum of Understanding with EGO/SMA we
may get some coatings manufactured where the Ta2O5 is doped to modify its properties.
Ta2O5 is a well understood material, its optical properties are close to Advanced LIGO
requirements so it will be helpful to exhaust all possibilities of improvement before a new
material is fully researched. Also, the test of different materials on the large coater at
SMA is difficult because the cost of the targets is very high. As an example, the price for
a high purity and flat HfO2 target is ~$30,000.00.
Garilynn: Polishing Status
Advanced LIGO Test Masses-
A draft specification and drawing for the LASTI Test Mass was completed, this is also a
first article ITM. The drafts have been sent to crystal systems for quote.
http://ligo.caltech.edu/~gari/LIGOII/E020389-01_LASTI-TM.pdf
http://ligo.caltech.edu/~gari/LIGOII/D020150-02-LASTI-TM.pdf
_________________________
Homogeneity Compensation - Goodrich has delivered the 25 cm sapphire blank with
compensating polish.
I've measured the homogeneity of the piece. The good news is that they have
compensated the inhomogeneity of the piece. See the image at
http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~coreopt/GoodrichComp.JPG This represents the central
150 mm diameter of the piece. The measurement is through side 2 (see below) reflecting
off side 1 and back through the bulk. I have not subtracted side 1, yet, this is the situation
where the homogeneity appears best.
See the Goodrich data at: http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/docs/internal/C/C020137-
02.pdf (yes the first page is blank..oops.) I believe they have subtracted surface 1 in this
view. The blob at 8 o'clock may correspond to what I measure at 12 or 6 o'clock.
The bad news is that the piece appears badly scratched, either that or it has something on
the surface that doesn't clean with acetone and methanol. The surface specifications were
waived in this instance because the piece has several bubbles breaking through the
surface, Goodrich can't possibly control the bubbles. However it is interesting to note
that most of the "inhomogeneity" now comes from the scratches and spiral machining
marks.
The other bad news is that they appear to have confused which side they should be
working on. What was a nice 4nm surface on side 1(former) is now the compensatED
surface (the new side2) This is proven by the characteristic defects at the bottom of both
upper images at http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~coreopt/SurfacesPostComp.JPG
This image shows the clockwise change of the surfaces
Surface 1 before Goodrich (upper left)
Surface 1 after Goodrich (now surface 2 the "compensated" surface)(upper right)
Surface 2 before Goodrich (lower right)
Surface 2 after Goodrich (now surface1)(lower left)
It's interesting that (speaking currently now) the compensating polish compensates for an
error polished into Side one (did they try compensation on this surface at one time?), yet
the specification calls for the side one data to be subtracted from the inhomogeneity.
I have been in touch with Goodrich regarding these results. They believe that they can
take out the spiral features on side 2. They have no idea what the scratches are, they
don't think it comes from dirt because the piece was cleaned before it left Goodrich.
Mechanical Loss:
Sheila/Gregg
On the coating thermal noise project, we measured Q's on sample 3a which was coated
by MLD with a tantala/alumina coating. Based on previous measurements of a
tantala/alumina coating applied by Wave Precision (General Optics) made by the
Glasgow/Stanford collaboration, we expected a Q a little above 1 million. We found, for
both butterfly modes Q's of 88,0000 and for the drumhead mode a Q of 69,000. These
give values of phi_coating of 9 10^-4 and 1 10^-3, respectively. This is compared to
the result obtained by Glasgow/Stanford for the Wave Precision coating of 6.4 10^-5.
We are now discussing ways to determine what is different about the MLD coating
compared to the Wave Precision one to better understand what is causing the internal
friction in the coatings.
This sample has also given us evidence of Q degradation due to charging of the sample.
The first measurement on the butterfly mode of this sample gave a Q of 21,700. Upon
opening the bell jar, we measured the electric field using an Electrostatic Fieldmeter. The
field was as high as 340 V/inch. Using a nitrogen gas deionizer, we removed the charge
so that the field read 10 V/inch (about the sensitivity of the device). Upon remeasuring
the Q after deionizing, the Q was found to be the 88,000 described above. We are in the
process of trying to understand, explain, and reproduce this measurement.
We also examined the effect of baking on the coating loss. We took sample 3, which is
coated with 30 even layers of silica and tantala by SMA/Virgo, and baked it for 24 hours
in air at 115 C. We then rehung it and are in the process of remeasuring the Q. So far we
have only found the X butterfly mode, but it has a Q of 536,000 compared to 532,000
before baking. So it doesn't appear that baking at this low a temperature has any effect
on the Q.
Plans for Coatings project
There are samples coated at MLD with tantala/silica to be annealed. The samples will be
annealed and analyzed for optical loss first and we wil then use the results to make a
decision about how to anneal the mechanical loss samples. The optical loss samples will
be annealed two at a time at three different temperatures; 400 C, 450 C, and 500 C.
Whichever temperature gives the best optical loss will be used on the mechanical
samples, and we preserve the option of sending some samples to SMA/Virgo for
annealing if higher temperatures prove to be best.
The next coating run at MLD will be niobia/silica. This coating has been shown to have
low optical loss, but we haven't measured a Q on a coating containing niobia. The next
coating run at SMA/Virgo will be 3/8 lambda silica-1/8 lambda tantala. Using the results
of the previous round of Q measurements we can predict the Q from this coating, so this
will be a test of our understanding of coating loss at this stage. There is a proposal to do
the subsequent coating run at SMA/Virgo with doped tantala in a tantala/silica coating.
We will wait until we have results from the above coatings before making a decision on
this.
Update on coating phi's
We now know that the tantala/alumina coating from MLD had 47 layers, starting and
ending with tantala. The tantala layers were 130.12 nm thick and the alumina were 162.7
nm, for a total coating thickness of 6.9 microns. Using this thickness and the measured
Q's on the thin samples at MIT gives coating phi's of
phi_coat_bf = 1.1 +/- 0.1 10^-3
phi_coat_dh = 1.3 +/- 0.1 10^-3
Slightly more lossy than calculated before. A preliminary result from the same coating
measured at Glasgow gives
phi_coat = 3.6 +/- 0.4 10^-4
This subtracts off the loss from a mass annealed at SMA/Virgo. An MLD annealed
sample just arrived in Glasgow, measurements on it are beginning. Q measurements on
thin samples like the MIT sample are also beginning at Syracuse.
Ju Li/David Blair: High Optical Power Test Facility Project Summary (Perth)
Here are the activities down here for last month:
· Preliminary installation of a 3 stages vibration isolator with Euler
springs in Gingin.
· Completed the manufacture of a electrical static actuator for test mass
and testing gear.
· Finite element modeling of thermal lenssing in sapphire is under way.
Also, in the 5:00 pm telecon, there will be more discussions on the high power test
facility and sapphire substrates:
The LIGO Laboratory have proposed supplying LIGO1 type small optics suspensions
with sapphire test masses for use in the Gingin tests. In addition, the candidate suspension
that we are suggesting for Gingin can be found at
http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/docs/D/D960001-C.pdf
Mike Z. summarized the pros and cons of the selection:
____________________________
- The thermal gradients that matter are within a beam radius or so, and the radiative
boundary condition at the periphery scales simply (basically, a DC thermal offset
temperature depending on how much material is between the source and the radiating
surface). Ryan's simulations of the scanned-beam heater bear this conjecture out.
- The smaller pieces have significantly better optical uniformity. This improvement is
evidently more than one would expect from just the fact that the smaller blanks are
thinner; Gari feels it could be because there is more freedom to select good zones from
the boule when the finish size is smaller. The leadtime for small pieces is also much
shorter so starting over would not drive the schedule much.
Although folks are apparently still thinking deeply about whether the wiggly 15 cm m-axis
pieces we have will even "work," given their measured inhomogeneity, it's likely
that whatever the inhomogeneity problem it'll be much less an issue with smaller mirrors.
- The other true "grail" of the Gingin experiment besides thermal loading, if we have our
druthers, is to investigate the cavity length and alignment dynamics under photon
pressure. A lighter mirror will enhance such effects and make them easier to study.

From: Bill Kells <kells@ligo.caltech.edu>

Have been continuing work with Erika on the TM polish
requirements (prompted by the CSDH LSC presentation) involving
FFT code runs. Currently we are awaiting comparision re-computes
by the CSDH group. Goal is to resolve the apparent
dicrepancies.

The SB imbalance studies were summarized in two talks this
weeks. This was originally AdL oriented, but has now become
 of interest also for LIGO I commissioning (potential noise
 source).
 
Participated in the IOO DRD.
 

From: Helena Armandula <ahelena@ligo.caltech.edu>
Advanced LIGO Coatings

The mechanical loss measured on substrates coated by MLD with Ta2O5 / Al2O3 is higher than expected. These results, obtained at Glasgow and MIT, contradicts the "Q" measurements obtained some time ago by the Glasgow group on the same materials coated by another vendor.
Steve Penn, from Syracuse, also observed high birefringence on the coated substrate that he is about to measure.

At this time MLD is coating "Q" substrates with 30 - 1/4 wave layers of Ta2O5 / SiO2. The objective is to compare them with substrates coated at Lyon with the same materials, the same amount of layers and the same thickness.
Annealing is still an issue. MLD's coatings break down at ~500 degrees C. They see defects (bubbles) of 10-20 micrometers in diameter more prominent around the edges.
At our request, they will anneal 1"dia. samples coated on the same run at 400 C, 450 C and  500 C.
After absorption measurements are made on these parts, an annealing temperature will be specified for the "Q" substrates.
 

From: Peter King <pking@ligo.caltech.edu>

2.2 Advanced LIGO
    A two-day trip to Stanford will be made next week to increase the power
of the 10-W laser currently on loan.  It is intended to increase the power
amplifier pump diode current and tweak the alignment of the optics inside
the laser.  After those steps are completed, the temperature of the laser
will be tuned.
 

From: Janeen Romie <romie_j@ligo.caltech.edu>

AdLIGO Suspensions
The Physics machine shop is bending maraging steel blades for us.
I've created Solidworks and AutoCAD drawing formats.

Determining osem needs for procurement effort.
 
 
From: Riccardo DeSalvo <desalvo@ligo.caltech.edu>
Akiteru

Eventually I can send you a 'real' goo news. We have managed to lock the
3m
cavity yesterday evening.
The suspended mirrors are aligned using the local optical levers and the
digital feedback, and the longitudinal control was done with standard
analog
electronics (stolen from Aso's setup), with the inertial damping off.
Although the front mirror was not oriented correctly (the refrected
light
was not aligned with the input beam), the cavity could be locked at
TEM00
mode. Stability of the cavity was quite high and it was locked for about
two
hours till we intentionally broke the resonance.
This must be an important milestone for the experiment, and there are
bunch
of measurement to take now!
Thank you,   Akiteru
 

Seiji made the best comment for all of us:
“Takamori-kun,
Congratulations!  Congratulations! Congratulations! Congratulations!
Congratulations!
I am very happy to hear the success of the locking. Yes, this is
definitely
the most crucial milestone for the development of SAS!”    Seiji
 

Michael, Hareem, Eric

More trouble with cryostat’s vacuum. Exhaustively leak checked, no leaks
found from anywhere to anywhere, nor across closed valves.  After
regenerating the cryo pump for the nth time achieved high vacuum but
after two and a half hours (during the night) the pressure spiked up to
0.02 Torr and then stabilized at 9 10-3 Torr.  For the rest of the night
it crept up to 0.01 Torr.  It is as if the system had temporarily open
the isolation valve to air and saturated the cryo pump.   Nobody can
explain, we will probably ship back the entire system to Quantum Design.
 

Michael

Mapped the cryostat measurement setup, now can drive heather in
calorimeter and read temperatures at ~ 7 Hz.   Holder for calorimeter
puck loading almost ready.
 

Hareem, Jan, Kelin, Bill

Tried splat cooler.  MoRuB found to sticks to crucible instead of
floating.  Problem tracked to the materials.  The crucible is Boron
Nitride and its Boron reacts with the Boron of MoRuB.  Made a test with
a fused silica crucible, better but it gets soft.  Building a Al2O3
crucible.
 

Kelin

Prepared lots of 80 100 110 and 120 mg MoRuB beads and other alloys for
splatting.
Preparing optical fiber vacuum feed through for  cryostat’s Q
measurement puck.
 

Aso

Calculating folded pendulum suspension thermal noise first results
coming.
 

Ric

Pushing papers.
Paper deadline, three weeks left for:  IP measurements (Szabi),  MGASF
measurements (Virginio), MGASF simulations (Virginio, Giancarlo),
Horizontal accelerometer (Alessandro).
Soon to start : 3 m hyerarchical controls (Akiteru),
Ongoing: SAS pre-isolator remedial option (Riccardo).
 
 

For additional information about this report, contact sanders@ligo.caltech.edu